The “New” Humanism is the belief that human experience and rational thinking provide the only source of both knowledge and a moral code to live by. New Humanism rejects the idea of knowledge “revealed’ to humans by gods or in special books. This lead-in is important to Critical Race Theory because only living things, and primarily human beings among them are the center of moral observation. Science and reason are the means of making sense of it. Promoting and supporting human flourishing and championing human rights for everyone are about all there is. [British Humanist Association for the one life we have.]
Critical Race Theory has replaced Humanism as an academic discipline within the Sociology departments of many universities. Being originally built upon an intellectual framework of Marxism in the 1930s, it was undercut in America by the success of the Civil Rights movement and the work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the political success of President Johnson’s pursuit of The Great Society and the civil rights and voting rights acts of the middle 1960s. The proponents built upon Marxism by substituting “Race” for Marx’s economic dialectic of capital and workers. In America it was too hard a sell to overthrow capitalism to save workers, so in order to maintain the ideal of a “revolution” White supremacy of America’s dominant class was chosen to be purged. Critical Race Theory has now been substituted as the revolutionary battleground of many former Marxists. America’s critical institutions, schools, universities, businesses, and particularly within the human resources departments are the places being invaded. The media, particularly The New York Times has sponsored CRT by publishing the 1619 Project, achieving sponsorship by the Democratic Party, recruiting left-leaning media and motion picture industry celebrities, and placing the 1619 Project into K-12 schools as a part of the curriculum. CRT has also replaced Rawlsian “Social Justice,” and in particular substitutes “equity” for “equality,” There is a huge and dangerous difference. Equity to CRT means “revolutionary Marxism.” Equality under the law in the sense of the Declaration of Independence is superseded. There already are a few people who demand that a new Constitution of the United States has to replace the present 1789 (as amended) version.
Among the startling tenets of CRT are:
1. Suspending property rights, seizing land and wealth and redistributing them along racial lines (see Cheryl Harris, Harvard Law Professor).
2. Ibram X. Kendi has proposed creation of an independent agency – unaccountable to any elected branch of the federal government – having the power to nullify, veto or abolish any law at any level of government and curtail the speech of political leaders and others who are deemed insufficiently “antiracist.”
3. According to CRT interpretation, to be truly “antiracial” one also has to be truly “anti-capitalist.”
4. The Constitutional authority of the federal government to protect individual rights and presumably the entire slate of the Bill of Rights Amendments protecting individual rights and freedoms would be replaced by race-based anti-discrimination and group-based rights.
5. Diversity has been made into an overriding tenet that supersedes other management and performance measures. Diversity has overridden talent as a selection criteria for employment.
The tenets, if implemented, even partially, can only lead to reduced productivity and efficiency in every institution in which it becomes a part and have terrible repercussions for the nation.
The public response to CRT has been muted by reason of the chilling effect of the “cancel culture” which aids and abets CRT. According to a recent Gallup poll, 77 percent of conservative respondents are afraid to share their political beliefs publicly for fear of getting mobbed on social media, fired from their jobs, and are afraid to take part in any public debate.
It is only recently that parents of public school age children have become aware of CRTs threat to their children and finding their children are being indoctrinated by teachers and new curricula being taught “behind their backs.” As a result of this publicity, the most recent polls show increased percentages of the population are unalterably opposed to CRT, and particularly in public schools. Still 19% of the polled participants are in favor of CRT
Publiustoo.com July 15, 2021
